South Jersey's Opinion Destination

New Jersey’s Heroin Crisis: Is Narcan Helping?

The following policy memorandum seeks to encourage local, state, and federal lawmakers in New Jersey to implement legislative changes to the current medical practice surrounding the prescription of opioid medications. The memorandum has been generated due to New Jersey’s increase in heroin overdose deaths despite the wide distribution and use of Narcan, the opioid overdose antidote. The memorandum is supported by literature from peer reviewed academic and medical journals, some of which specifically recommend legislative action that alters prescribing of opioid analgesics.

It is important to understand that legislative action equates to law, while recommendations of best practices are merely recommendations which may or may not be ignored, and allow for a high amount of discretion.

Local, state, and federal lawmakers can expect this policy memorandum to be mailed to their offices shortly, with the hope of initiating the process of writing the legislation our society needs in order to prevent opioid and heroin addictions in the first place, thus reducing the currently great need for overdose antidotes.